Debate #2: Lord Edam

Star Trek Shields: Plasma Weakness

Take away the supporting evidence and the idea is nothing more than
fantasy. An idea with no support is as valid as no idea at all.

Exactly the same way you attack evolution theory, no doubt.

Don't ever remember attacking evolution theory. I said I was a
creationist - I didn't say I spend my time attacking other people's
religious choices simply because they don't see things my way

In both cases, the fallacy is that you have not taken away the
evidence. At worst, you misrepresent it.

Or correct the misrepresentations of others.

At best, you point out that it might possibly be regarded as
something else.

And if the "something else" is as valid as what I'm
objecting to, how can we say which is right?

Science is not absolute, Edam. You could dismiss any theory if
your litmus test is that piece after piece of supporting evidence
could possibly be something else.

If most of the evidence is wrong and the rest has a 50/50 chance
of contradicting the theory or supporting a far simpler theory then
the original theory is wrong, no matter how much evidence has been
twisted after the fact to fit it. In science, you create a theory and
predict what will happen. That isn't what we do. We take evidence and
formulate the best explanation for all of it. We are more historians
than scientists. Unfortunately for you, you've treated it all
exclusively as a scientific analysis - you've created your theory
before examining the evidence and you are going out of your way to
make everything you can find fit it. If you did things the historical
way - start with the evidence and make a theory to explain it - you
wouldn't get anywhere near your conclusions. But I'm going on again,
and we both know how little time you have for this debate you
insisted on, so lets continue...

You spend all your time writing off my arguments as strawmen, then go
and do the same.You say: ST shields may have a weakness to
charged particles, and here's examples of itI say: clear
mitigating circumstances and misrepresentation. You have no evidence
for your opinion. It is just fantasy.

You're lying, Edam.

We'll see who's lying Mike.

You flatly deny the possibility of a weakness,

I keep insisting that is not the case, but you don't believe me,
so let me put it more bluntly. If there is a possibility of a charged
particle weakness none of these examples are firm enough to prove it.
Several of them are blatant lies, others have clear mitigating
circumstances you continue to insist are irrelevant. There are, at
best, two exampes that would indicate a charged particle weakness,
neither of which, either together or combined with others, are strong
enough to actually prove the case.

When someone makes a vague theory of a "possible" weakness
and you attack that as a "mistake", what could the
"correct" position possibly be if not a flat denial
of the possibility? Honesty is obviously not your strong suit.

Stop with the accusations of dishonesty Mike.

you lied aboutStarship downyou lied about Interfaceyou
lied about the order of FC and A Call To Arms

You are not perfect, Mike. For each accusation of dishonesty you
make against me I can prove dishonesty from you.All it does it
distract from the debate and demonstrate how childish people can be
when things don't go their way.

Weapon Power

At the time, yes. It was all prior to the decision to do away with
the TM. There is some support for it. The Pegasus normally
results in torpedoes ranging anywhere from a few kT up to GT range.
The Die is Cast (both original strategy and demonstrated
abilities with the dustclouds & shockwaves), shockwaves in For
The Uniform, destroying a large asteroid in Rise (Voyager)
- average firepower is normally round about a few MT or higher.

Which is why we use the shockwaves, and the dustclouds, and the
original simulation. The larger of the shockwaves come from the the
beam weapons rather than torpedoes in this case anyway

Simple thermodynamics also come into play. If these were
multi-megaton blasts in atmosphere, where were the fireballs?

you won't get much of a fireball if the blasts were under the
surface - as would be consitant with wanting to get rid of the crust
entirely.

Why did the entire attack look no more impressive than a night-time
lightning
display? You can't pump that much energy into a small portion of the
atmosphere and have it dissipate without revealing its presence,
Edam! When a nuclear weapon explodes, it superheats the air in its
vicinity to millions of degrees, creating a firewall which rises
through the air and slowly radiates heat to its environment. If
there's no white-hot fireball, there's no multi-megaton explosion.

If there's no white-hot fireball there's no multi-megaton
explosion on the surface.

I'm tempted to ask for more detail regarding your other examples, but
it's more important to establish whether this is even relevant. The
original subject here is the weakness of shields to energetic
and/or charged gases, and even if the ship can survive a 1
megaton nuclear warhead explosion at close range, that does not
disprove the possibility of a particular weakness.

The specific subject here is the weakness of the shields to 400GW
(200GJ) of charged particles, and how this took the shields down in
an inordinately short period of time, and kept the shields down no
matter how much Worf tried to re-establish them. The specific subject
here is how this is contradicted by other examples of charged
particles of higher energy not taking the shields down

First and foremost, there are numerous nebula shield failure
incidents, and you have failed to provide an alternate explanation
for them.

the only example you have provided has been explained. your
misrepresentation about Chain of Command will be dealt with below, I
believe. I have also provided numerous exampels where ships have
entered nebulae unharmed - how does your theory deal with these
examples?

Besides, how do you know that the charged-particle output of the
weapon doesn't simply pass through the shield and hit the hull, while
the EM radiation is absorbed and retransmitted by the shield?

Because that would mean 70% of the torpedo's energy not being
blocked by the shields - the difference levels of damage between
bleed-through and unshielded impacts are far larger than this would
allow. With shields - a few consoles explode. That's about it.
Without shields - bye bye hull.

"What's the reference?" If we use modern units and the only
meaning of "iso" which makes sense when attached to "ton",
the reference is "one ton of TNT", Edam. If we don't, it's
up in the air and it's a useless figure.

Unless we already know "megaton" refers to tons of TNT
it's a meaningless figure. Unless we already know the reference
temperature or pressure, "isobar" and "isotherm"
is meaningless. It is meaningless to us - just like gigaquad
is meaningless to us. But it is far from meaningless to the
people who use it - the people of Trek. You assume "isoton"
refers to tons of TNT, but why should it? Why not tons of C4, why not
tons of Korbarg'hed (popular with the terrorists in Debroli II I
hear.)

Harping on about "iso=tons of TNT" is useless.
Concentrate on what the weapons are shown to do, in dialogue (General
Order 24 and similar examples from TOS, turning a planet to a smoking
cinder in Broken Link, the whole TDiC mission plan) and in visuals
(as previously referenced)

Fine, then why don't you solve the problem? Explain why
Federation shields were collapsed by electrical discharges in ST2,

damaged ship, power of the discharges, unusual particles in the
nebula (that one really needs cross-referencing with VOY: Flashback,
but I don't have that episode available)

Cardassian shields were collapsed by nebula gas in "Chain of
Command" , Borg shields were collapsed by photosphere gas in
"Descent Part 2",

The verteron burst came before the shields were up and overloaded
all their systems. From this episode and a number of DS9 episodes
(mostly dealing with the wormhole) it seems verteron particles are
intimately linked with subspace, and large amounts of them cause
distrubtion to subspace fields - you know, the stuff that they use to
make their shields. for example, you will hardly ever see a shielded
sihp in the DS9 wormhole - because they use verteron particles to
make the safe passage.

or whatever particles were in the "nucleonic" beam from the
mind-control device "The Inner Light".

We'd have to know what those particles were first. This was
clearly not the same problem as the Enterprise had in ST2 - that was
known to the crew, this was not. Infact, they could not explain how
the particles (which got through shields which were not on full power
- the shields that blocked the earlier nucleonic beam scanning the
shields) managed to remain connected to Picard, and when Data finally
found a way to reflect the particles they nearly killed their
captain.

The E-d isn't too good at sharp turns. Turbulence (sharp
unexpected wind) is a problem for them. Why take risks when it isn't
needed? Other ships (Defiant, Voyager, shuttles) do not have this
problem.

Explain why ships ("Descent", "Redemption") and
even whole shipyards ("Shadows and Symbols") can be wiped
out with solar flares.

Descent - unatural flare against unshielded ships. Redemption
unnatural flare cause by a ship going to warp near the star. Shadows
and Symbols bloody enormous flare that shot out across several
hundred thousand km in a matter of seconds to take on an unshielded
shipyears.

No, but a thousand of them would definitely be a threat, and a
thousand 4.2GW phaser banks is just 4.2 TW. Still nowhere near
"multi-megaton", Edam.

And what effect do Phasers have on shields? We know they have
increased effects on some materials - what effect do they have on
shields? (plus, if there is a charged particle weakness, why did it
take the Feds until the borg threat to develop plasma phasers -
surely adding plasma to their main weapon would make it more
effective, as it worked on the weakness the shields are known to
have)

[Re: Night Terrors] Their biggest weapon that
was being gradually drained by the rift, directed into the rift vs. a
great big uncontrolled explosion. Obviously the explosion has
different effects on the rare energy absorbing rift than directed
energy does. Like firing a jet of gas through a hole in a pipe, vs
just setting off the gas in an uncontrolled manner. Does this mean
chemical explosions outside the effects of the rift have the same
properties? We can't answer that until we have either more evidence
or proper understanding of the rift.

Red herring nitpick

You brought the episode up, Mike. Live with your actions.

You act as if they had no way to create an explosion besides the
chemical burn.

they had no way to create the explosion besides the chemical burn.

News flash: photon torpedoes create explosions, Edam.

And require significant amounts of energy to launch, and if they
are based on anything like starship technology would use some form of
subspace/AMRE field to travel (actally required for warp travel, as
we know they can do from eg. TNG: Emmissary) - harldy much use in an
environment that sucks up subspace energy ridiculously quickly.

They knew exactly what this "rift" was, and if a photorp
would have been more effective than their big deflector-dish weapon,
they would have used it

Unless there was a problem getting the torpedoes far enough away
to get them out of the rift without destroying the ship.

Face it; their entire weapons complement was inferior to a large
chemical explosion! And since you obviously have all the scripts, you
can look up the episode for yourself and see that they're talking
about the amount of energy, not some mystical property of the
chemicals involved in the reaction. That also fits with "Star
Trek: Insurrection", where they destroyed So'na warships with a
chemical flame because their weapons weren't up to the task. Remember
that one? Or are you going to try to wriggle out of that one too?

Why should I try to wriggle out of it? It has nothing to do with
the charged particle weakness, and we should base the abilities of
weapons on what they are shown to do not what they are claimed to do.
If the conclusion of that is that Trek can create chemical / nuclear
explosions more powerful than matter/anti-matter that is just another
canon fact we have to live with.

"Survivors" Escape Clause

[Re: Survivors] When it clearly contradicts other examples of similar
attacks (ie, the ability of the shields to absorb charged particles)
we should look at mitigating circumstance - in this case, the very
clear mitigating circumstance is that it is all an illusion created
by a superbeing. You know it isn't real, so why should you treat is
as such? [You go on to repeat this nonsensical idea of the entire
attack being an "illusion" or "fantasy" 5 times]

Too bad, so sad, but it was not an illusion, Edam.

I guess they really destroyed teh ship as well, then? I guess the
house and garden really did exist then?

They took real damage and real casualties. And during
that very real damage, its systems withstood what they
measured to be a 400 GW blast, which means that its effects were
identical to a real 400GW blast.

I notice you've ignored all the other examples where their systems
really did show what was not really there - why are they any
different to this one? Kevin Uxbridge created everything in the
illusion in an attempt to make the Enterprise leave.

LOL! you can try signing up for a physics.org e-mail address if you
like. Doubt most people would get much luck, though. Last time I
checked only people who fulfilled the academic requirements for
Chartered Physicist status and were willing to join the IoPgot one.
Why not ask the people
in charge

I suspected you would try to appeal to the authority of that domain
name.

I'm not appealing to the authority of anything, Mike. You
brought it up. I'm just clearing up your lies. I would have been
quite happy to go through the whole debate without mentioning my
background. I would have quite happily let this drop after correcting
your mistake. Why do you want to carry on with it?

Physics.org is owned by a publishing company, Edam.

Yes, it is owned by Institue of Physics Publishing, the publishing
arm of the UK Insititute of Physics.

And while I don't know how to get a physics.org E-mail address (and
you know full well that I can't possibly get a response to E-mail
inquiries on the weekend),

You need a degree in the sciences or engineering, then you need to
get a current IoP member to sponsor your application to membership,
and you need to pay £30 (more for overseas - actual price might
be a bit off, anyone who's interested can follow the link above)

I'm pretty sure that you don't meet the requirements you refer
to.

who cares? All you are doing here is attacking me and my education
- something you know nothing about. For someone so big on pointing
out logical fallacies maybe you'd like to tell us which one refers to
attacking your opponent rather than his claims.

They include extensive professional experience in the field, and you
work in computer tech support! Is computer tech support regarded as
physics?

is this relevant to the debate or are you just looking for an
excuse to attack me rather than continue? For someone so quick to
complain about logical fallacies you sure do like making them, don't
you?

If you want to shore up your credibility despite your creationism

My religious beliefs have no relevance to sci-fi debates.

and your bizarre attempt to attack a sketchy theory by saying it's
imperfect rather than providing a better explanation for the
incidents I brought up, then why don't you simply scan your physics
degree and post it?

Because it is entirely irrelevant to the debate. The
qualifications of the debator are irrelevant. It is the claims that
are under scrutiny. Why do you insist on repeatedly attacking
people's education? do your claims not stand on their own? Do they
need the weight of your degree behind them before anyone will take
them seriously?

Why go through this roundabout way of "proving" that you're
a chartered physicist by referring to your physics.org E-mail address

I'm not trying to prove I'm a chartered physicist (I'm not), and I
didn't mention my physics.org e-mail address. why did you
mention it Mike?

instead of simply showing people the degree that you supposedly
needed in order to get it? And while you're at it, why don't you try
to explain how you graduated from physics without understanding the
basics of the scientific method?

Why would I be interested in doing something that has no relevance
to the debate?

But it DOES invalidate the effects of their systems - the warp drive
wasn't working as hard as it should for the Traveller episodes,
because the superbeing was doing the work. The Inertial dampeners
worked better in Q-Who because Q was doing all the work. The shields
worked badly in Survivors because Kevin Uxbridge made them fail.

Irrelevant. Their instrumentation worked fine in those cases, and it
is the readings on their instrumentation which you are trying to
dismiss. Kevin Uxbridge made the shields fail ... with something that
had the exact same effect that a real 400 GW blast would have had.

Or Kevin Uxbridge made the shields fail with something that read
as a 400GW blast would, but had far greater effect. It was a fantasy.
It was not real. The instrumentation cannot be trusted for the 400GW
blast any more than it can for the fact they destroyed the ship, or
there was a house, garden and two humans on the planet. this is even
more obvious when you consider the 400GW blast is several orders of
magnitude below the minimum firepower of torpedoes - torpedoes that
just happen to be 70% energetic charged particles.

Whilst you ignore the full context of the situation and easily
explainable contradictions, and declare this the real answer. How
does your theory deal with the fact that a couple hundred GJ of
charged particles drop the shields in one episode, but the shields
withstand similar energies from charged particles in another?

It doesn't, and it doesn't have to.

So I can point out as many inconsistancies in your long list of
examples of a charged particle weakness as I like, and you will
continue insisting "it's still valid it's still valid"

now I know why you had to drag out my education - your only hope
is to discredit me rather than my claims.

ST2 Escape Clause

So what use is this in VS debates (and specifically, Trek-Wars where
no one seems to have lightening guns)? The electrostatic dicharges
(lightening) caused the problems - where's the lightening in most
chargd particle weaponry?

Lightning is made up of charged particles, Edam. They're called
electrons. Look it up, Mr. "Chartered Physicist".

There's more to lightning than simple electrons, Mike.

Some nebulae are generating energies that do threaten the
shields. no need for charged particle weaknesses - just accept
that shields handle whatever [energy level], and anything that drops
the shields is above that level.

What kind of explanation is that? Are you seriously suggesting that
these nebulae were hitting the ship with so much raw energy that its
shields collapsed,

Or they contained verteron particles, or other exotic particles
known to damage subspace fields.

Face it; you have no explanation whatsoever for nebula-related shield
failures,

the only nebula related shield failure given was the Mutara
nebula. Where's the rest of them, and why didn't similar things
happen in the other nebula examples I gave?

so you're reduced to ludicrous fantasies about the Mutara nebula
being more energetic than the close proximity to a star! If the ship
has a fixed energy handling limit and "anything that drops the
shields is above that level", then how do you explain the fact
that the shields were dropped by a nebula which was demonstrably not
that energetic, since it did no damage to the ship whatsoever once
its shields dropped?

electrostatic discharge & metal = flows through the surface of
the metalElectrostatic discharge & insulator = blocked or
blows up the insulator.

Shields have different conductive properties to the metal hull of
ships, so are affected differently by electrostatic discharges.

The Cardie ships in "Chain of Command Part 2" could only
stay in there for a brief period of time because their hulls were
being degraded by corrosive nebula gases. Their shields were down,
but only a blithering idiot would lower his shields with full
knowledge that this would let corrosive gas eat away at his hull!

Or they traded the energy required to keep the shields up with the
knowledge that they would not be in there long enough to be in
serious danger from the corrosive gasses. Or shields raised means a
nice big energy signature giving away the ships that are hiding in
the nebula. The shields were not up in the nebula, the shields were
certainly not dropped by the charged particles as you continue to
claim.

STG Escape Clause

[Re: STG BOP] a technological weakness of the cloaking system. Hit it
just right (luckily Worf knew the "just right" that was
needed) and, even though the shot is not enough to overcome the
shields, the cloak engages and (as a result) the shields drop.

Wrong. The cloak is an internal system, Edam.

Direclty linked to the shields - you know, shield up cloak down.
cloak up shields down. There was a weakness such that something that
would not be enough to overpower the shields would be enough to cause
the ship to cloak - a weakness peculiar to that cloak/shield
combination. A weakness corrected later.

Booby Trap, where they had an
uncorrectable continuously increasing energy drain. Infact, (baring
major changes between the script and episode, of course), the problem
was not radiation leaking through the shields - it was the shields
failing within three hours from the energy drain, which would result
in the radiation killing everyone onboard. [snip chunk of script]

Red herring The point was that you cannot deny penetration simply
because there was no obvious structural damage.

you cannot prove penetration, which is required for your charged
particle problem. There was no penetration in Booby Trap, the
problems with the shields in booby Trap were not caused by the
radiation. There is no point in mentioning Booby Trap whatsoever.

Beating on the Strawman

the shields on the old BoP have a specific vulnerability to a
specific low level ionic pulse that Worf knew about - not a general
weakness to all charged particles. Consider all the evidence, not
just the bit you want to use to support your theory

Strawman. I never claimed that there must be a "general weakness
to all charged particles"

[Re: nucleonic beam from "Inner Light"] Yes. One is
charged, the other, well, we just don't know. If it isn't charged it
does not support your case, unless you want to extend that to "a
weakness to all particles everywhere", but then we're back to
just the normal shields with no particularly notable weakness

Strawman again. My claim is nowhere near as over-arching and
generalized as you make it out to be.

you were listing examples of charged particle weaknesses - that's
what you said, and that's what you did. this deals with that list of
examples. The Inner Light has a 50% chance of not supporting your
case, and infact more so given the discussion above.

Maybe. Why not?

Because then you're back to no weakness at all - and if there's no
weakness at all there's no need to list examples of the weakness.

I did mention both "high temperature gases and charged
particles" in my shield page; do I need to explain to you that
high temperature gases are composed of high velocity particles, Mr.
"Chartered Physicist"?

you also went on to give a list of examples you claimed were a
charged particle weakness.

Besides, I never claimed to know exactly what causes the
weakness; I offered up a "possibility", but the point is
that the weakness does exist, and you won't admit it.

None of your examples of a general weakness are required. There
are specific weaknesses - particles known to affect subspace fields,
be they charged or not, but a lot of your examples are simply
nothing.

Honesty

We could spend all day pointing out how we are "assuming the
other bloke is telling the truth" - it gets us nowhere. If you
have reason to belive I am misrepresenting anything bring up the
reasons. I do you the same honour. In fact, that's what this part is
all about.

I might have believed that crap a week ago, but I don't make the same
mistake twice. The games you played by witholding the "Relics"
screenshot and defending your wildly exaggerated 470,000 m² area
figure despite full knowledge of its falsehood have clearly revealed
you to be nowhere near the honest and forthright debater that you
pretend to be.

Which has so much to do with my claims it might as well be all
there is. Oh, hang on...

Specialized Shield-Piercing Weapon Escape Clause

[Re: shield-piercing weapon] How would an alien species on the other
side of the galaxy know about the weaknesses of Alpha quadrant
technology? Explain that and you might have a point.

Irrelevant,

Thanks, then I guess it is irrelevant Star Wars is from a
different galaxy when I point out how effective Dominion weaponry
will be against SW ships.

the point is that the Voyager crew knew it had special
shield-piercing properties, and they had to develop a countermeasure
for those properties. Even if it was unintentional on the part of its
designer, it was very real to them, and that's the only thing
that matters

One of the aliens from the species that invented the weapon said
it was designed to penetrate any shield, not the Voyager crew. The
special properties of the weapon were by design not accident. Or
haven't you watched this episode before making claims about it, Mike?
If the positions were reversed there would probably be wild
accusations of lying being fired off now, but we now it's just bad
memory of a never seen episode, don't we?

"Interface" Escape Clause

[Re: Interface] so because no one said the problem wasn't the shields
we can assume the problem was? What reason is there to assume the
shields were the problem at all? what reason is there to assume the
charged particle weakness of the shields specifically was the
problem?

Unless you've got some other explanation, a threat to the shields is
the best explanation. The USS Raman was destroyed shortly after
shield failure in the planet's atmosphere, remember? How can you deny
that this had something to do with the shields and maintain a
straight face?

Clearly it had something to do with the shields - but was it
really charged particles? Or something else. Like, maybe poor power
available on the stricken ship, or the pressure being too great
(going back to the end of part one - the shields use forces to
counter forces)

you're the one who's finding evidence of a charged particle weakness
in an episode where nothing like that is ever mentioned or
indicated. You have the scripts for TNG(for your TNG canon database).
Check out Scene 47 - "two shuttle craft staggered between the
Raman and the Enterprise, with their shields adjusted to refocus the
tractor beam" - how can they do that if shields fail when they
encounter the charged particles of the gas giant's atmosphere (or
does the weakness only apply to the E-d's shields?)

The shuttles were supposed to stop at a much higher altitude than the
Raman, Edam. Don't be obtuse

Ah, so even though the shields are vulnerable to charged particles
in nebulae they aren't vulnerable to far greater numbers of charged
particles in certain parts of gas giants atmospheres? your ideas just
get worse and worse with every comment you make, Mike.

. They were afraid to go down to the Raman's altitude,

Because they were stretching the abilities of the probe.

"Arsenal of Freedom" Escape Clause

And yet the hull temperature was nowhere near danger levels - they
were in far more danger in Descent than they were here. The
ship was nowhere near being destroyed.

Red herring. Even if the ship's hull would have survived the heat
after shield failure, the point was that the atmospheric
friction killed their shields!

which were still up when they left the atmosphere. I've actually
provided a possible explanation for this in the discussion no
turbulence up above, and teh force vs force aspects previously.

Don't be a smart-ass, Edam. Your position is far too weak for
that. Are you going to seriously pretend that Worf's statement about
imminent shield failure means nothing?

imminent shield failure on a ship that is half missing, yes. How
can this be applied to the ship as a whole, to the shields as a
whole? How much did they lose when they seperated? You'll need to
explain all of that if you want your idea to have any validity.

"Descent" Escape Clause

[Re: Descent CME] Yet it managed to cover the distance to the Borg
ship outside the corona in just a few seconds. Obviously looks can be
deceiving....Even if it was the chromosphere the CME still
covered(several thousand km) the distance in a second or two -
clearly far faster than the "dozen km/s" it started off at.

You're still missing the point, which is that we don't know the
distance. The corona and chromosphere aren't like national borders
with clearly defined lines, Edam.

No, but they are generally accepted to have a certain depth. They
say "we're out of that" so we assume they are out of it and
use the common limits to judge teh distance - not still burried half
way in

You seem to assume that it must have been completely outside the
corona or the chromosphere, as if there was some velvet rope and they
got stopped by the bouncer. It's just a matter of gas density, Edam.
There was obviously some point beyond which the E-D could go but the
Borg ship couldn't, although it would have obviously tried to get as
close as possible. Your inference about the Borg ship being thousands
of kilometres away is unsupported in fact.

It was stated to be outside, we know where outside is commonly
accepted to be, so we can use that as a judge. If you want to reduce
the figure go ahead and try. that'll probably mean watching the
episode, though, something you seem a little adverse to at the
moment.

As for "looks can be deceiving", they happen to be canon in
this case.

so how did the burst cover the distance from the surface of the
star to the borg ship in a few seconds? Transported half the
distance?

Too bad for you, Edam. Funny how you're willing to use screen time
("a second or two") as direct evidence while ignoring
visuals. How long did the flare really take to hit the ship? A time
lapse during a camera change is an acceptable rationalization, but
simply ignoring the ship's destruction scene and its flare
velocity is not.

riight. The E-d could onyl survive a few minutes in the star, but
we actually ahve a 10 minute time cut whilst we wait for the flare to
do its work.

you theory conveniently ignores situations such as Interface
and A Matter of Time where the E-d specifically uses its
shields (or the shields of shuttles) in environments where the plasma
you claim should threaten the shields exists. Infact, in A Matter
of time the shields were used specifically to attract high energy
plasma - why would they do that if it was a threat to their systems?

It didn't look like high energy plasma to me, Edam. In appreciable
quantities, high energy plasma looks like the surface of the sun.
That was just a bunch of upper-atmosphere pollution.

They said it was high-energy plasma, we have no reason to believe
they were wrong(and small quantities of high energy plasma can look
like the stuff in A Matter of Time - just look at the pictures from
things like SPHERE or STAR or other high-energy plasma experiments),
and the shields certainly held, so this case of high-energy plasma
clearly contradicts examples of lower energy plasma over lesser area
having greater effect - how do you explain that? How do you explain
the high-energy gas frmo Clues that had similarly useless effect on
the shields? Personally, I don't think you've even seen A Matter of
time recently - I think you're just bluffing because you ahve
problems accepting stated fact, but that would be dishonest, wouldn't
it?

As for "Interface", you continue to ignore the fact that
the USS Raman did suffer total shield failure despite your
preposterous claim that the incident has nothing to do with shields!

It has nothing to do with your claimed charged particle weakness.

Ah, I see. But they stay so close that they can't avoid a CME moving
at a dozen km/s? Don't make me laugh. If they just wanted to wait it
out, they could have pulled back a half million kilometres and just
sat there.

And lost the Enterprise when it left in a different direction.
oops.

Explain why they needed special shields to go inside, and why
Federation scientists were shocked when somebody proposed a
theoretical shield designed to survive entry into a star!

Key point being into a star. Not just the atmosphere.

What?!?!? The "entire example" includes every part
of it, including the visuals which you ignore! How can you stand
there and claim that it's OK to completely ignore the most objective
part of the evidence because you're "relying on the entire
example"? What does the word "entire" mean in your
dictionary, Edam?

entire - everything - the whole thing. The fact the CME covered
the distance in a few seconds.

No, you're trying to prove that Federation shields have no weakness
other than to brute-force energy levels,

I'm fairly certain I know better than you what I amtrying to
prove. This is specifically about your list of charged particle
weaknesses, and how they are not what you claim. Most of them have
already been demonstrated as such.

As for your attempt to paint the whole incident as a "side line"
by claiming that the Borg ship's shields were down, you're just
desperately searching for loopholes.

Just stating the facts, Mike. Showing why it doesn't support your
claims

Don't play games, Edam. It's obviously not a natural CME,

then how can you be certain of its properties? You don't even know
how phasers would affect other materials, so you can't deduce the
likely properties.

So,
how does a phaser induce a solar flare in a star Mike?

Red herring. The point is that regardless of how it's induced,
it is composed of photosphere gas being hurled upwards, and it will
obey natural laws.

so you know for a fact its density will not change, you know its
internal energy won't change. You know all this because you know
exactly how pahsers work. Hang on...

Scout ship? I think you're imagining things
again Mike. who said that was a scout ship? In Scorpion Seven
of Nine present a Multi Kinetic Neutronic Mine - quite a powerful
little thing, by all accounts. Where are you getting the idea it's a
scout ship? Borg scouts are normally small(ish) cubes like that one
Hugh was found near in I Borg

It was capable of defeating the Federation's most powerful starship
in battle. It was a full-fledged starship by every conceivable
definition, and since it was relatively small, I figure it was the
Borg's idea of a scout ship.

We know what their scoutships look like. the only time we see the
ship in Descent it is described as a Multi Kinetic Neutronic Mine. If
you want to say it isn't a mine (aka bomb - explosive device) find us
another example where it is something else. Until then, it's a Borg
bomb.

Edam, this kind of empty rhetorical answer merely proves to me that
you can't adequately defend your arguments, so smart-ass remarks are
all you have left.

I'm correcting your assumptions about my arguments. You I assume I
label a scout ship a bomb - I don't. I label a bomb a bomb. they call
it a bomb, so it is. If you want it to be something different that's
up to you

Sure. The Borg multi-kinetic neutronic mine, which scatters
nanoprobes over a five light-year wide area without
vapourizing them in the process, the way an explosive device would.

Do you know the properties of borg nanoprobes? no? Then how can
you say an explosive device would vaporise them?

Recap

I present piece after piece of concrete evidence

misrepresentations, lies and fantasies.

which are consistent with the idea that some kind of special
vulnerability exists to certain high temperature gases and charged
particles. In each case, you try to show that there is some
ambiguity, some kind of doubt. This is not a court of law,
Edam. You are not the defendant, you do not get the
advantage of an asymmetrical burden of proof, and you can not
slither away by attacking my theory without admitting that your own
theory (which you claim does not exist, even though you described it
twice) is vastly inferior. Science is not about certainty; it will
always incorporate a certain amount of doubt. You've got to find a
better theory in order to kill this one, not just prove that
this one's not perfect.

I've done better than prove this one is not perfect - I've proven
it has no reason whatsoever. None of your examples require this
theory, many of your examples are directly contradicted by apparently
similar examples. If you want this to be a theory work on it. Take
the examples that need correcting and correct them. That is, after
all, what this is about - pointing out the mistakes you have made in
the page.

Your attempt to claim that the only way to hurt Federation
shields is brute force

And a very small number of known weaknesses, none of which are
related to a general weakness as you described.